Devoid
by PikaCheeka
Summary: GUNDAM 00 FIC. Sumeragi, up late drinking one night, receives an unexpected visitor, and an even more unexpected talk. Implied Lockon x Allelujah, Allelujah x Sumeragi, Lockon x Setsuna


A/N – Gundam 00 fic. Still no category for it despite how many times I ask, so I post it here. Anyway, I am back from my hiatus, as is obvious. Thanks to everyone who sent me luck and prayers. Now I bring you fic!

Sumeragi, up late drinking one night, receives an unexpected visitor.

PG13. Implied Lockon x Allelujah, Allelujah x Sumeragi, Lockon x Setsuna.

Devoid

By PikaCheeka

He stood in the doorway quietly, and by the time I noticed him he had likely been there for several minutes. It isn't easy to hear someone approaching on this ship, it having such minimal gravity. I jumped slightly, reaching for the bottle, ready to hide it, but it was only Setsuna. I wasn't in the mood for Tieria to bitch at me about my drinking, though Setsuna would not say anything. He never did. He moved further into the kitchen and stopped again.

I stood up and propelled myself towards the fridge, not waiting for him to speak, as I knew he wouldn't. He would only stand there uncomfortably. Well, making me uncomfortable. I don't think he's ever felt that in his life. "Chocolate milk okay?"

He didn't answer. Instead he continued to stare at me. "His door is locked."

It took me a long and confused moment to understand what he was talking about. Then I knew. "Oh." I moved back to the table and sat again, placing the bottle across from me. It was as if he knew why I was drinking.

Lockon was the only person on board he ever spoke to normally, so it was reasonable to assume he was the one Setsuna was referring to. After all, it was fairly common knowledge that Setsuna had the habit of slipping into Lockon's bedroom and letting himself be read to. Because Lockon was the only one allowed to treat him like the child he still was. Lockon was the only one allowed to see a spark of interest in his cold eyes. Christina had panicked when she first found out. She had run to me, babbling hysterically about how the older man was seducing boys, but I knew better. There was no such tension between them, only mind-numbing blind adoration, concern, and curiosity. Not a sexual curiosity, at least not that I had ever been able to notice. Setsuna at times seemed as strangely sexless as Tieria did, though I suspected he was anything but innocent. Child soldiers never were in that respect.

And Lockon's door was likely locked. For the same reason Allelujah's room was empty.

He sat at the table beside me, which caught me by surprise. I hadn't noticed him move, nor had I expected him to sit next to me. He didn't say another word, only sat there, staring at his bottle of milk, as if he wanted me to fill the silence, demanding me to with his own inability to do so.

"He's an adult, Setsuna," I sighed after a long moment, lifting up the half-empty bottle of beer and swishing it absently. I knew the words were stupid, meaningless, as Setsuna was easily the most mature person on board at times. He had seen more, done more, and survived more than any one of us. And he was only sixteen. Eight years younger than Lockon. Eleven years younger than me. God, was I really that old?

"I know." He fidgeted as he said it, finally reaching for his drink, only to inspect it at a closer viewpoint. "So is Allelujah."

"Yes," I answered softly. An adult, or at least a month or two away from being one, but still closer to Setsuna in age than to Lockon. Far too young for me. Seven and a half years between us almost to the day, and those years made it impossible, set us infinitely far apart. If it had been the other way around, no one would ever have questioned it. It was perfectly normal for the man to be older, even by a decade. And it was perfectly normal that Lockon was several years older than him, as when it is two men it isn't strange either.

"Does it upset you?" He asked it so quietly I almost believed I imagined it. It was something so unlike him to say, besides.

And I laughed, surprised at my own bitterness. Should I not be past this? I was almost thirty. People my age don't cry like a child because the person they love isn't interested. They shrug and move on. I'd made enough men do that over me in my time, so why should I expect it to be different now that I was the one ignored? No. He didn't ignore me. He loved me. It was clear he did. But I was his big sister, his confidante and sometimes-best-friend. He was obedient and over-protective, and I was fairly certain he would take issue with any man who dated me, but not because he was jealous. He would do so because his chivalric code of fraternal love commanded it. "Is it that obvious?"

He nodded, as if completely unaware of how deeply this entire conversation was disturbing me. "Same here."

His words didn't match my question, and though it wasn't difficult to know what he meant by it, I was still surprised. Was he genuinely admitting he was upset about this, or was he only trying to comfort me? But Setsuna was not one to waste words on comfort. That would have been Christina, Lockon, Allelujah, but never Setsuna. Because he had never known comfort, and when you live sixteen years without ever knowing it, you grow accustomed to not having it, and it seems superfluous. The food for the weak. I suppose it is. And I don't know why I asked, but I did. Morbid curiosity, maybe, or simply masochism. "You do know what they're doing, don't you?" I asked gently.

"Sex." He said it simply, stupidly. No foolish ideas of them making love, no angry words of fucking or banging. Just one single word, devoid of all meaning. It would have made more of an impact if he had said copulation even, or some other scientific and tedious word. But in saying it in such a way as he did, he made it completely empty. I was being hurt by a word.

I had known it was coming. Had recognized the looks Lockon gave him, the predatory gleam in his eye that Allelujah responded boldly to with his own. Had noticed the touches, the flustered look they sometimes had if one walked into the same room as them unexpectedly, as if they had just jumped off one another. And the day Tieria had come to me, raging incoherently about them being unfit, being too human and too damnably stupid, I didn't bat an eye. I would have laughed were it anyone other than Allelujah he spoke of, would have asked how exactly Tieria found out, but I didn't dare open my mouth. I simply shrugged, and that was the end of it. I didn't bother telling him it had been going on for months. The sex had, at least, ever since that time they had traveled to Ireland to lay flowers on the grave of Lockon's parents. Because after that trip they were different together.

"Setsuna… It's normal. There's nothing wrong with him, with either of them. They're the closest in age and they're both ready and able adults." I trailed off for a moment. Could I actually say they were in love? They cared about one another. That was clear. And this was something that had been long in coming. It wasn't just one violent fuck all of a sudden that escalated into this. It had been developing silently for years.

"You can say it."

"What?"

"Why not me?"

The words shocked me, more than anything else he had said that night. But before I could respond he stood up and propelled himself towards the door. He was gone. He had been gone before he even said those last words, because who he said them for I would never know.


End file.
